Note To Future Self

I mentioned previously that the Milford Track is limited to just 40 trampers at a time (well technically, 40 people start each day… since each night’s stay is pre-set, you never see the folks ahead or behind you)

Actually, that’s not quite accurate. There are 40 “independent” trampers at any time. Those would be folks like us who are carrying all their own gear and do their own cooking. In addition, the Department of Conservation has allowed one “concession” (tour company) to operate guided walks along the Milford Track, also limited to 40 at a time. The guided walkers have “catered food,” and sleep in “lodges” with “sheets” and “hot showers.” It creates quite a class distinction.

I found we interacted with the guided trampers almost as much as with our fellow independent walkers. The guided lodges tended to be a couple of kms before the independent huts on the trail. Since we walked pretty slowly, we could count on the faster guided walkers (and they were plenty fast … they didn’t have to carry very much) catching us throughout the day.

Inevitably the guided trampers would start blowing past us in the morning, then we’d regain the lead while they sat down for their sumptuous morning tea, or some sort of six-course lunch on hand-woven blankets by the edge of the trail.

Probably the best symbol of this distinction was the above hut, found atop McKinnon pass, the rest break after the one long climb of the tramp. The door on the left was for guided trampers. I’ve been led to understand that room was heated, and had coffee, tea, cookies, sandwiches and fruit. The doorway on the right (no door for us) was a bare concrete room with a single gas burner. Sniff.

Luckily, we had to share the same loo:

I have to admit I had some preconceptions about the guided trampers. In a word: rich American investment bankers. And, admittedly, there were a few type-As (cough .. Germans) who used the guided tramp as a chance to go fast-and-light and blow through the tramp as quick as possible.

But the vast majority seemed to be folks for whom the accommodations were real enablers — older folks on their dream vacations and an unbelievable number of Japanese grandmas. Put in that light, the guided tramp seems much more acceptable, if it’s the difference between doing the track and not.

As a side note, the independent trip costs something like $200/head (split between the huts, and the before- and after-boats and buses), not including food or transport to Te Anau. It’s not a small amount, and rightly Kiwis are starting to complain about being priced out of their own country. Short of introducing two-tier locals vs tourists pricing, DOC will need to be creative to keep the Great Walks accessible.

After the fact, we learned the guided Milford track is about $1900NZD. Now that’s a lot of money. Yet if you were coming in from out of country, maybe not a native English speaker, but really wanted to do “the greatest walk in the world,” maybe it’s worth it.

Throughout our tramp, I was surprised when the guided walkers would refer to us independents as “Freedom Walkers.” At first I was somewhat taken aback at the decidedly civil-rights-movement term, until I learned that for most of its 100-plus year history, the Milford track was exclusively guided. It was only in the sixties that local tramping clubs organized “guerilla” tramps along the track, to insist the track, traveling across public land, should be publicly accessible.

As previously hinted, Anna and I recently took our turn at the Milford Track, one of NZed’s Great Walks. Unlike in the States, where the “great walks” tend to be epic in length and preparation (Appalachian Trail, Pacific Crest Trail), NZed’s Great Walks are universally short (under a week) and typically more catered than the typical backcountry experience. The Milford is the pinnacle of this accommodation: four days and three nights of easy walking.

Unlike just about everything else in this country, the Milford Track actually fills up. Reservations for the Great Walks open on July 1st and the Milford was largely full by the end of July. The walk itself is 33.5 miles long, and trampers (limited to 40) stay in a pre-ordained sequence of huts. You aren’t allowed to go any slower, nor any faster, nor backwards, nor spend two nights at a hut. It should be mentioned Milford is pretty much the only Great Walk with this many rules.

Four days is actually a long time to think about blog posts (really. what else did you think I’d be doing? enjoying the view?), so I’ve got grand plans for a series of posts. Maybe. If we ever get around to it.

Before things get esoteric, though, we’ll start with a basic travelogue and photo post:

First, here’s the overview topo map (courtesy of DOC):

The walk actually starts with a bus ride from the tourist mecca of Te Anau to Te Anau Downs, then a boat ride to the start of the track on the shores of Lake Te Anau.

And winds its way up the Clinton River valley to the Clinton Hut.

The huts themselves are palatial by kiwi standards (though I will say the hut system makes backcountry travel radically different from tent-camping in the states). The first night is a good time to get to know the 39 other trampers you’ll be sharing the trail with for the next few days. Better hope none of them are snorers….

The second day continues up the Clinton River, passing through forest, clearing, rockfalls and avalanche paths, while the valley walls get closer and closer together.

Finally ending at the Mintaro hut:

The third day is the “challenging” day as you light out early from the hut to ascend McKinnon Pass. The ascent is something like 600 m, followed by a short walk across the saddle, and a 900 m descent down the backside.

(the pass is that notch in the ridgeline to the right)

We had the slight misfortune of heavy fog on the ascent, so we didn’t see much of the Clinton Valley behind us.

But once descending, the sun came out and we were able to enjoy the Arthur River valley before us.

Finally reaching the Dumpling Hut.

The fourth and final day is spend on a rather lengthy tromp down the Arthur river to Sandfly Point. The day’s walk seems specifically designed to enrage the Type-A personalities, as the tramp take about six hours, and each tramper must meet their pre-appointed boat (typically at 2 or 3PM) to get off the track. This leads to perpetual watch-checking and shuffling of feet at the slightest suggestion of rest breaks or flagging of the pace.

Despite that, everyone reaches the end of the trail and meets their boat.

Which takes you across the final bit of wet stuff to the town of Milford.

Hi Jenny (and Peter and Owen and Sara),

Thanks for the Christmas presents! Perfect for the rainy west coast.

Well now. Another week, must be time for another work jolly.

I’m fresh back from a quick trip to the beautiful burg of Westport, whence I visited Solid Energy, the NZ coal company (side note: “Solid Energy” is perhaps the best … name … ever for a coal company). In the grand old tradition of exhausting natural resources before developing other industries, NZ is still mining coal like it’s going out of style, though I’ve been told it’s largely very pure high-carbon coal which goes over to Asia for steel, rather than power production. Technically speaking, SE is an SOE: a state-owner enterprise. It’s run like a company, but Wellington takes a big chunk of the profits, and the rest are reinvested.

Solid Energy actually has a number of interesting problems which are, er, geospatial-ish.

For example, Solid Energy is busy mining on the ridgeline above Westport. It’s not really “mining” as you imagine it, rather it’s “open cast” mining, aka scraping away the earth and hauling away the bits which happen to be coal. Long before Solid Energy started gnawing away at the earth with their 100-ton excavators, however, the hills above Westport were worked by more traditional miners, who turned the hills to a swiss cheese of poorly-mapped tunnels.

So the problem is simple. When you drive a 100-ton truck over a 100-year-old mine shaft, bad things happen. It’s worth Solid Energy’s time to make a really good map of the old mines. There are some historical maps, but without precision satellite navigation and all that, they’re only so accurate.

There are basically two ways to go at the problem. The traditional method is to drill a bazillion holes and see which ones hit solid rock and which ones go through open space. At $15,000 a hole, it’s also a good way to flush a lot of time and money down the loo.

The alternate proposal is to have teams of surveyors actually explore the old mines with a rather pricey laser scanner and make a map as they go. Of course, it’s not a perfect method. Large portions of the old mines are inaccessible due to cave-ins, raging waters, smoldering fires, foul humours, etc., but the sections which can be reached safely can then be mapped quickly and inexpensively.

One major obstacle to mine exploration is a “stopping,” a cement-block wall built by the olde-timey miners to block off parts of the mine once they were done with them. A stopping could be used to wall off an area which was unsafe, unloved, on fire, full of water (there’s that fire and water theme again). Or they may just stand between one perfectly safe portion of the mine and another.

So the Solid Energy surveyors need a safe way to cut a small hole in a stopping and judge whether it’s safe before they go through the trouble of actually cutting a man-sized hole in it.

Enter the GRC. With our proven hjistory of bodging, hacking-together and camera-misuse. We’ll be working with Solid Energy to make a “camera-on-a-stick” for cheap inspection through stoppings. Should be interesting.

Being a truly civilized country, we use metric (ISO) paper sizes. So “normal’ paper is size A4, which is altogether taller and slimmer and more euro-chic than boring old “letter” paper.

Oh, and we use two-ring binders. Two!

Sorry, slow news day.

We’re fresh back from a week on the road, tramping the Milford Track, the self-style “greatest walk in the world.” Can’t say I disagree, actually.

There was also sea kayaking.

So for today, it’ll just be downloading photos, doing wash and catching up in the garden. Apologies for the (ahem) long break in our regular blog publishing schedule.

This afternoon, we here in the southern hemisphere were treated to an annular eclipse.

neat-o.
We now return you to your irregularly scheduled blog posting.

I get literally inundated with requests to go on at length about the minutiae of my job. All the long hours spent playing solitaire, taking tea breaks and generally looking busy. Perhaps someday…

Unfortunately, on Tuesday, my daily routine was disrupted by an off-site visit.

This is the Rolleston Glacier. Well, technically, Rolleston Glacier is the little bit of white way up at the top of the mountain (Mt. Philistine) (no, I didn’t make that up). I was the guest of the jolly academics from the New Zealand Snow and Ice Research Group (really, I didn’t make that up either).

A few NZSIRG fellows from the University of Canterbury are interested in kicking off long-term study of the Rolleston glacier, looking at seasonal and annual variations in size. In March, they’re going to perform a rather extensive laser scan of the glacier. Simultaneously, they’d like an aerial survey of glacier. In the future they might take multiple aerial surveys of the glacier each year to watch the snowpack grow and recede.

Which is where I come in. One of our ongoing projects over at the GRC has involved strapping cameras onto a variety of light aircraft to make aerial photography faster and cheaper.

Of course, doing an aerial survey requires a little advanced look-about (the New Zildish term being “recce”), so I gladly accepted the NZSIRG’s invitation to take a walk to the glacier.

I hadn’t really counted on the 1000 meter scree slope ascent.

Or the snow.

But, much to my surprise, my lazy non-mountaineering flatlander butt did make it to the glacier.

Once there, we started shoveling snow and, suddenly, my finely honed Wisconsin skills kicked in.

(we’re putting up a temporary weather station in the here)

I have to say, I only had a moderate amount of trouble keeping up on the uphill, but I was destroyed on the downhill. Literally and truly, the rest of the chiseled, hardened glaciology grad students (all of whom moonlight as glacier guides for the tourists) achieved something like terminal velocity descending the mountain. I tiptoed rather gently down the loose rock slopes.

That said, my legs are still completely wrecked two days later.

Happy Fourth Anniversary, big guy.
And welcome back.
Glad you’ve decided to rejoin the party.
Now get back to work.